For all the hoopla about self-driving cars, it’s unlikely they’ll be able to navigate through unusual circumstances – such as when construction requires driving on the wrong side of the road.

Nissan believes the solution is to have “drivers” who can remotely transmit instructions to cars, when the car isn’t sure what to do.

The driver won’t take over active control of the vehicle. Issues with latency could make this dangerous. Instead the human will evaluate the situation and transmit a sequence of maneuvers the car will execute.

In this Nissan is drawing upon the same technology that NASA uses to send navigation instructions to Mars rovers.

NASA likens it to lifts. You don’t need a lift operator, but you need a help button in the rare instances that something goes wrong.

Such a system could smooth the adoption of self-driving cars, as consumers and regulators will take comfort in knowing there’s a human on hand if required.